Maybe
by mintcrisp
Summary: There was one thing Jade knew with absolute certainty; she could trust no one./Tori's actions in TGP causes Jade to question a building block of her worldview.


Title: Maybe  
Rating: PG-13  
Warnings: None  
Pairing: None (though it could be taken as pre-femslash for Jade/Tori)  
Summary: There was one thing Jade knew with absolute certainty; she could trust no one.|Tori's actions in TGP causes Jade to question a building block of her worldview.

Disclaimer: I do not own Victorious.

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Jade West had learned at a very early age that people couldn't be trusted.

It was a simple fact of life – everyone looked out for themselves, and eventually, everyone would step on someone if it meant they could get themselves a little closer to the top. Everyone. It was an unspoken rule.

That was one of the things very few people got about her; while it was true she didn't pull any punches, she never expected anyone else to, either. Which was exactly why she despised 'nice' people. They were the worst, because they would smile sweetly to your face while sharpening the knife they would jam into your back at the first opportunity. And since she would rather take a punch to the face than a knife between the shoulder blades, she treated everyone else to the curtsey of knowing when her wrath was coming and why.

She had been taught, time and time again through hard, painful lessons, that this was a basic truth of the world. Her mother had lectured her on it when she was young, as she sat on the red, padded bench in front of her mother's vanity while the older woman packed on her make-up and occasionally painted Jade's lips and eyelids a rainbow of colors and brushed reds and pinks over her cheeks.

"Never believe what boys tell you." She would say. "Because they only want one thing, and eventually, they'll find someone younger, prettier, more eager to please that they can get it from." And "Never listen what girls say, because it's not you that they took notice of – it's the thing that you have and they want. And they're waiting for you to turn your back so they can take it."

And her mother even generously provided a practical example of her lectures, when she filed for divorce and moved overseas, only seeing Jade twice a year. Her father remarried barely a month later – to her mother's ex-personal assistant, fifteen years his junior.

So, the rules of Jade's life were simple – trust no one, keep everyone at a distance, and, at all cost, hurt them before they hurt you. That was why her friends were who they were. Cat was practically a kindergardener, and could barely remember her own address, much less have ulterior motives. Robbie she didn't trust at all, as he wouldn't even flinch before betraying any and all of his friends; the only reason she tolerated him was because he was so terrified of her that she could subdue him with minimal effort and, failing that, his own blundering stupidity and natural bad luck would doom any plans he made to failure. Andre was an interesting case as he was intelligent enough to pose a threat, if he decided that betraying her would benefit him. However, she found herself with an odd, grudging respect for him, mostly because, unlike Cat and Tori, he knew the world wasn't made out of rainbows and unicorns and, unlike Robbie, was determined to follow his ambitions in spite of it. And, she reassured herself, she could go toe-to-toe with him if need be, because he certainly wasn't any smarter or more devious than she was.

And then there was Beck. She hadn't _chosen_ to let him be a part of her life, like she had the others. He had just... latched on and refused to let go, no matter how hard she tried to shake him and push him away, until she had accepted that he was there, a part of her, and there was nothing she could do about it.

She broke all her rules for him. She let him _in_, after he had sat scratching at her walls long enough. She trusted him with almost every one of her secrets (which was impressive, since she was a bank vault to everyone else). And she couldn't hurt him first. Not that she hadn't tried, but all of her standard tactics, or even her emergency failsafes, worked on him. Every insult, every barbed word, every pride-shattering blow bounced off of him like it was nothing and, when he was being particularly irritating, he would return them all with a smile.

He had said things, things that other girls would have desperately drank in like a man gulping down the first water he'd seen in days, things that they would have grabbed onto and hid in a pretty little box deep inside themselves so they could look over them to put a stupid smile on their face for the rest of the day. Things like "I love you.", "I'll never leave you.", "You're so gorgeous.", and "You can trust me." Things that her mind had instantly filed away under Bullshit People Say But Don't Mean.

The break-up was something she expected. From the day he had decided to forcibly jam himself into her life, she had known that he would leave like everyone else. And, eventually, he had proved her right.

But. There was suddenly something that didn't fit. A girl who contradicted the basic rules she had believed beyond a shadow of a doubt for seventeen years.

Tori. Fucking. Vega.

Jade didn't _understand_. Her first impression of Vega was that she was a vicious bitch who could cover her true nature with a saccharine smile and painfully fake sugary sweetness. And she had been afraid of her, because with her bright smiles and 'nice' words and adorable sass, she actually had something that she could use to lure Beck away. Which was only proven when he kissed her.

Then, Vega did a complete one-eighty. Jade had gotten her detention, and Tori had been handed the perfect way to get back at her... and she hadn't used it. As Jade had pointed out at the time, people weren't _nice_ to someone who had just fucked them over, that wasn't how the world _worked_. And Tori had replied that maybe Jade should try being nice to her, perhaps that would 'work'.

It had made Jade think. And she had almost considered it. Almost. But, then she had rationalized that Vega had simply passed over a _minor_ opportunity of revenge, and was waiting for a better opportunity. After all, a few weeks detention, while being a pain in the ass, wasn't something life-shattering. But a large dose of public humiliation, or taking Beck, or locking her out of acting roles? Those were things with more staying power.

After that... incident, they had found some almost stable ground. The animosity was still thick, and certain people might describe them as "hating each other", but there was no longer any constant plotting for revenge, at least on Jade's side. Some times were better than others, such as when Tori actually helped Jade get Beck back (presumably since Jade's misery didn't satisfy her when she wasn't the cause of it), and some times were worse (Steamboat Susie and the 'Prome' event came to mind).

But then. But _then_. Tori Vega got the opportunity of a _lifetime_. And she's not referring to the Platinum Awards gig.

It couldn't have been more perfect. They were alone, and Beck tried to _kiss her_. She could have let him, then asked him to be her boyfriend (if he didn't beat her to the punch), then showed up at school on Monday and rubbed it all over Jade's face (which would have hurt like _nothing els__e_ and made her big break not even _worth it_), for an indeterminate amount of time. The only thing that might have made it fractionally better is if she had known that Jade was getting a front row seat to the kiss. Except she had _already done that_.

Jade had just taken the Platinum performance from her, by far the worst thing she'd ever done to the girl, and the perfect revenge was sitting right in front of her; all she had to do was just let it happen, but no. She stopped it. "'Cause of _Jade_."

It made something in Jade _hurt_, in a way she couldn't explain. It was crazy, but it almost would have been better if Tori had kissed Beck, then driven to the rehearsal, made-out with him some place Jade couldn't _avoid_ seeing them, then punched her in the face and topped it all off by spitting on her. At least that would have _made sense_.

Instead, she claimed "Kissing her ex-boyfriend? I can't do that to a friend." Which tied Jade's stomach up in knots and made her nauseous. Because she had seen Tori's acting, and it wasn't that good. She was completely honest and genuine, and she didn't remember that the video chat was up, which meant that she wasn't playing for any audience.

It wasn't the fact that Tori considered her a friend. She was almost positive that if someone held Tori at gunpoint, she'd offer a hug and ask them to lunch. Tori thought she was friends with the entire fucking world. It was that she was unwilling to betray Jade, in spite Jade only showing her the minimal amount of kindness, and Jade being such a completely awful person, and the fact that there would literally _never_ be such a good opportunity for revenge ever again. Even when she didn't know there were any witnesses.

And what did that _mean_? It had been eating at her brain since the laptop snapped shut. And finally, she had been forced to face the answer.

That maybe it meant the world didn't work the way she thought. Maybe Tori Vega was actually a good person with no hidden agenda. Maybe she could trust someone. Maybe her mother had been wrong, just an angry, bitter woman venting to a six-year-old who shouldn't have been weighed down by her parent's baggage. Maybe the way she had treated Beck, kept him at arm's length when she could and expecting him to leave at every opportunity, had _made_ them destined to fail.

Maybe she could tell Tori about how, despite herself and her thoughts that she should know better, she'd so desperately _wanted_ to believe the pretty things Beck said. Maybe she could let Tori see her cry, voluntarily and not in a desperate situation where she was backed into a corner with nowhere else to go, and it would be okay. Maybe they could be friends; real friends, not acquaintances kept at a carefully calculated distance. Maybe.

Just... _Maybe_.

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-End-

AN: Almost 2000 words written in just under two hours. ...Not bad.


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